To The Rhythm Of The War Drums
by Native
Summary: Varric and Leliana both have their heroes.


**Warning**: Spoilers for Asunder (which I haven't read, here's to hoping I didn't totally butcher the events) and Inquisition itself (mostly extrapolations around what we already know).  
**Note**: For a prompt prompt on the DA kink meme.

_Today in Varric's Compendium of Nicknames:_  
* Sera is Arrow  
* Bara Warden is Beardy (really, Varric?)  
* Solas is Baldie (they should start a boys' band)  
* Dorian is Pavus (Magister was too obvious)  
* Iron Bull is Horns (_because why the hell not_)

* * *

**TO THE RHYTHM OF THE WAR DRUMS**

* * *

"Stories have to be told or they die, and when they die, we can't remember who we are and why we're here."  
Sue Monk Kidd, _The Secret Life of Bees_

* * *

- "The Inquisitor, Master Tethras. How is he?"

One day, Varric will hear Leliana's footsteps before her voice.

That day has not come yet.

- "Look, the lad is still fresh out of the fire. You have to give him a little more berth, let him come into it," he answers with a little more strength than was probably necessary, but theirs had been a long day, a long week, sixteen long mornings and nights to learn that another Circle had fallen, that they were too late. Or not late enough.

There had been fire and smoke and fear and it was like Kirkwall, except Hawke wasn't here.

There had been the description of a man resembling Blondie.

—

- "The Inquisitor has taken an… _interest_ in someone. It worries me," she says one day, as they silently peruse some letters, each at one end of the great table in Skyhold's main hall.

The soft glow of the torchlight does wonders for her complexion, Varric thinks idly as he glances at her over the rest of his impressive pile of missives. She had been beautiful once, and still was, in a way, but only an idiot could and would ignore the harshness here.

For now, his only answer will be the raise of an eyebrow and a half-smile, inviting, daring her to say more.

- "Cassandra told me," she starts, voice smooth and nice enough, "that the man who destroyed the Kirkwall Chantry was the Champion's lover."

The note he was reading does _not_ crumple in his grasp.

- "It occurs to me," he answers, cordial — jovial, even, "that the same man also was a close companion of the Warden once."

—

Andoral's Reach is an ancient Tevinter fortress that has been appropriated by the Mage Rebellion after what happened at the White Spire. Apostates have been flocking there since then, and it's only a matter of time before the Inquisition, the Templars, or both, converge on their position.

Trevelyan wants to go, _now_, and Cullen supports him, but Leliana is pushing in the other direction, talking of needing more time to mount their offensive, to prepare, that it's too early to engage their forces in a battle this delicate.

She had been there, Varric knows; had helped the survivors of the College of Enchanters escape the Seeker who, in the end, had betrayed the Divine and denounced the Nevarran Accord. It had to count for something.

- "Mages are feared for a reason, Inquisitor, and this citadel is full to the brim of their best and brightest. No offense, but we're still finding our legs here, and I, for one, am kind of attached to my innards and their belonging in my body," he smiles, and with a bit of effort, his eyes crinkle along with the curve of his mouth.

Somewhere on his left, Horns lets out a chuckle; Beardy is somewhat quieter, but only just, and he hears Vivienne huffs somewhere in their vicinity. Solas, thankfully, doesn't utter a word, seemingly taken with the pins-adorned map before them.

Cullen doesn't know how to stop, Varric thinks idly as the man launches into another tirade. Trevelyan's shoulders are set, his steely gaze now trailing over Val Firmin, Velun, to the Abyssal Reach.

The Adamant Fortress, then.

When he looks up, their eyes meet.

—

"_A shortcut for the weak or a crutch for the desperate; a fool's temptation or a last resort. _  
_My blood. My breath. Anything to stop a Blight_."

It's blind luck that allows Varric to be the one to come across a stack of notes: not exactly hidden, but not everyone would have been able to find them either, nested deep in the depths of a demon-ridden keep. At some point, the room must have been an office of sort, maybe even that of the Commander, if the tattered tapestries and once-beautiful furnitures are anything to go by.

It's been a long time since the Grey Wardens have sealed the heavy doors of the Adamant Fortress and retreated to Montsimmard, but the papers he has found behind on a corner of the desk seem fairly recent. As it often is with this kind of thing, they give just enough information to know that there is more afoot, but don't touch upon it, not really.

It's blind luck that allows Varric to be near when Trevelyan gives the papers to Leliana, hoping that she would be able to decipher more, or to find those who could.

She can't fake the widening or her eyes more than she can hide it, but the Inquisitor is more a warrior than a diplomat, for now, and so it goes by him unnoticed.

Varric wagers with himself that she won't say anything, and is so surprised when he loses.

- "I would recognize this writing anywhere," she says, and there is something he can't read in the curve of her mouth, the play of her throat, "It's Solona's."

—

Some weeks later, he finds himself thinking that "an interesting fellow" doesn't quite do justice to Loghain Mac Tir.

There is something here, a story, beyond the bards' songs and tales of heroism and redemption, of second chances. From what Varric has heard about the Warden, she was fond of those in particular.

He remembers Blondie telling him as much, and then "_It cost her—_".

- "_She would never have!_"

There had been times when things were tense, like when Beardy's jovial facade had creaked just enough for Varric to think that Cullen was going to get acquainted with the nearest window. Bless that man.

Regardless of the circumstances, Leliana had never raised her voice before.

Not this time with Beardy, nor when Arrow had helpfully told Pavus to go get fucked by a jar of bees in the middle of a very serious War Council, nor when Horns had been found dead drunk, terrorizing the help into cooking some Qunari recipe. Until now.

"_It's Solona's,_" he remembers.

- "She never had to," he corrects her, an intensity in his expression that Varric hasn't seen since Kirkwall, maybe.

- "She fought horrors no man should have to know, let alone battle. She killed an _Archdemon_, and she— _she would never have!_" Leliana finally explodes, both fists hitting the table with more strength than he would have thought possible, clearly incensed at Loghain's implication.

- "Grey Wardens have been known to use blood magic in the past," he continues; his voice is level enough, but there is a tightness to it, now, as she shakes her head, red locks framing a face appearing strangely youthful in her anger.

- "Anything to stop a Blight," Mac Tir says, and Varric can see the moment it hits home: the moment it hits her, as she flattens her palms against the wood.

—

- "I take it," he tries, careful and not without kindness, "that it wasn't all fun and games after the Warden conscripted you."

When Mac Tir turns to him and then doesn't breath a word, Varric realizes, chagrined, that his opening was sorely lacking.

Ah, no matter. They're heading back to the Adamant Fortress in the morning, except stronger of six Wardens from Montsimmard, Mac Tir among them.

Varric wouldn't be surprised to learn that the Warden-Commander of Orlais is hoping for him not to come back.

Well, Beardy could always use a friend.

—

Trevelyan is doing his best not to appear impressed or fearful, but for all that has happened ever since the Tears, nothing has really prepared him to what lurks in the Abyssal Reach.

When Hawke, Bethany, Anders and himself had set for the Vinmark Mountains, they hadn't exactly been prepared to head off in the Deep Roads again, either, but at least they had some prior experience with the matter, and, all in all, plenty of experience in all manners of sick and weird shit.

Him, not so much, though if Baldie's right, his sleep is plagued by more than nightmares.

At least their little expedition is comprised of more than four people, this time. With six Wardens in tow, the descent into the depths and through swarms of darkspawn isn't exactly a breeze, but close enough.

Stairs etched in stone, under the Adamant Fortress, behind seals and doors and traps recently cracked and opened. They all are on edge, kind of dumbfounded even though they should have known.

Someone had gone through here. _Someone._

Mac Tir pushes and pushes and never seems to tire, or to know how to stop. When they find another stack of notes, Varric watches him go through them again and again, fire and shadows playing tricks on his face.

—

"_One and six, two and five left._" — or so the notes say, but it doesn't help them.

They pass a seal, and then another and another, until it makes five and Varric feels light-headed because he _knows_. He knows the architecture, he knows what lays at the end of the road.

Except the Wardens don't lose it, even if he hears one of them whisper about an _echo_ when he thinks only his brothers and sisters can hear.

He warns Trevelyan, of course, and the Wardens don't seem very pleased with his story, but it's what happened, save for one or two details they can go without ("—_Hang in there, Blondie! We're going to get you out of this!_").

There's a mess of skin and bones in the last chamber, towards which Mac Tir stalks off before anyone else can react.

Scorch marks and broken altars, cracked stone and blood splatters. _Skin and bones_, a burnt shell of deformity. People fought here, and if what the traces left behind are anything to by, it was the kind of battle worthy of songs and tales.

- "Zazikel," one of the Warden breathes, strangely reverent before one of the shrines that adorn the circular room, and then the Veil tears before their eyes, and it's_ chaos_.

—

As they leave the chamber behind them, Varric catches Trevelyan giving a last, long look behind him, and then to Mac Tir, who is quietly conversing with Beardy and the other Wardens. No one dead. They were lucky (_and Mac Tir could give Aveline a run for her money_, he thinks idly).

Coming back to Skyhold is always a relief, even if Skyhold is not Kirkwall and his rooms aren't the Hanged Man. For all his escapades to Sundermount, the Wounded Coast or even the Deep Roads, the wild never was his thing.

It's the middle of the night and Vivienne is off to who-know-where as soon as they pass the doors (probably to scrape the dirt off, and they agree on that much at least); the Taint Brigade is hungry, and they head to the kitchen almost immediately, the Inquisitor trailing off behind them.

Leliana finds them in the middle of a larder massacre, complete with alcohol and the inappropriate jokes Wardens seem so fond of. Trevelyan laughs like Varric has never heard him laugh before, and it's good, for a while.

Then they talk of the _where_, the _how_ and the _what_, and she bits her lip after asking, "_Solona?_" and Loghain answers "_Long gone—_".

A muscle in the kid's throat jumps.

_Ah,_ he thinks.

—

- "The Champion, he is an Amell, isn't he? Would you talk to me about them?"

It seems that they are fated to have these discussions around the great table. Probably because they don't meet much otherwise, and Varric likes it here, too. There's always people passing through, which gives him an odd sense of familiarity.

- "I don't know what to say that you don't already know, Dusk. When my family got to Kirkwall, they were already in bad shape," he answers, mostly sincere. Some secrets are not his to give.

- "Solona, she was…"

He holds his breath, waiting; he wasn't waiting for that exactly, but…

- "Some things, she never talked about. Her family—"

He cuts her off, abruptly annoyed:

- "Didn't they abandon her when she was naught but a baby? What was there to talk about?"

She seems stricken, for an instant, more than a bit sad, and he would feel like shit if only he didn't remember the quality of Anders' voice when he had talked about her ("_She never knew differently,_" he had said, "_until the Wardens took her—_").

It's strange, this feeling, this anger, on the behalf of someone he doesn't even know.

- "Look," he tries, because he's nothing if not a smooth talker, "I'm sorry, it's just that I don't talk about Kirkwall often. For what's worth, your Amell would have been welcomed by mine. Leandra, the Champion's mother, bless her soul, sometimes she seemed more proud of Solona than she was her own children," he says, laughing a little and hiding his discomfort at using the Warden's given name,

- "The stories revolving around her were those she liked best. Bethany, too. I swear Hawke developed something of an inferiority complex after a while," he continues, and fuck if it doesn't hit a little too close to home, because it's true.

The man had been taken with Anders the moment they met. There had been several, memorable occasions in the years before they ended up together, when Hawke had come to him to drown his sadness and pine like there was no tomorrow. Anders' successive rejections had been bad enough, but _the rest—_

Leliana's dry chuckle gets him out of his thoughts.

- "He wouldn't have been the only one. She always had… an unique quality to her. She was easy to follow," she says, tone light and more than a little wistful at the same time, and in that last statement, Varric can read a thousand possibilities.

- "It must be a family thing then," he answers, half-joking, and they finish the night in companionable silence after that.

—


End file.
